


The Taste of Copper

by featheryjudas (noonesson)



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Blood Mage Hawke, Custom Hawke, F/M, M/M, also anders is dead, i love him but he's dead, who hates blood magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-26
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2019-03-24 06:34:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13805505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noonesson/pseuds/featheryjudas
Summary: 'Justice'. Branwen tenses at the word, and regrets it immediately. Alistair’s eyes widen. She can see his pause, the light of realization dart across his eyes, the tick of scratching his beard, because he wants to ask. She can already hear the words forming on his tongue- 'I’m sorry for your loss too'. She’ll do her best not to laugh, for what use is it to give condolences to a murderer?Branwen Hawke sought a contact in the Wardens, nothing more and nothing less, but Alistair will accept nothing less than friendship





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My favorite thing is making my favorite characters suffer together. Will be updated through the week, probably.

“So you’re Hawke.  _The_ Hawke?”

_The one and only_ , Branwen would have said, long ago, but the line is too sharp, too close, and it leaves a copper taste on her tongue.

“You may call me Branwen,” she says instead. “And you, you are the Warden Alistair.”

There are crows feet around his eyes, worn lines drawn across his forehead, but his grin is lopsided, dimpled, and boyish. It’s nothing like  _his_ , but then again, on his good days, his happy days, he’d have a smile like that, wouldn’t he? 

“That would be correct, Serah Hawke.”

“Branwen,” she corrects him again.

“Branwen,” he repeats. He takes a sip of the piss swill, but scrunches his nose like an ill-content nug. Branwen doesn’t blame him. The stuff makes Corff’s ale seem like an aged Tevinter delicacy. 

“This is a little bit like getting visited by a ghost, you know. Most people think you’re dead.” There’s that lilt of a chuckle beneath his words, but his eyes are questioning and waiting for an answer.

Branwen leans back in her seat, taking in the sound of boisterous laughter, of drunks tripping over their feet and begging for one more pint. If she closed her eyes, maybe the lighting would dim to a warm yellow, maybe a pair of thigh high boots would prop up onto the table, maybe there would be a crowd of folk, just to the corner over there, listening to the latest of Varric’s garish tales. Maybe she’d sober up to Merrill dozing off on her shoulder after a foolish attempt to outdrink Isabela, while Sebastian offers counsel to a silent, but attentive Fenris across the table. And maybe, if she looked to the left of her, she’d feel a warm hand on her thigh, squeezing at her gently–

But wistfulness and longing are the trappings of demons, and she won’t let one take hold in her heart, not again. So instead she meets him square in the eye. 

  
“Varric loves a dramatic exit,” she quips. “Makes sense that he’d vanish me in a puff of smoke  in that damned book of his.”  
  
Alistair’s half smile stretches into a full grin. “He does like to make myth out of men, I’ll give him that. Honestly I was expecting a giantess with a flaming sword. Maybe riding a dragon.” He pauses and cocks his head. “If you don’t mind me asking…”  
  
A small smirk tugs at the corner of her mouth. “Yes and yes.”   
  
The warden scratches at his beard and whistles in thought. “Huh. I wonder how Morrigan feels about the Champion of Kirkwall riding her mother-”

“Huh?”

Alistair chuckles. “Ah, nothing.”

A lock of black hair slips from her plait, and Branwen fiddles with it absentmindedly, tracing her finger across the worn ribbon holding it together. “Speaking of mythic men, Morrigan was Flemeth’s daughter, correct? You traveled with her when you were with the Hero.”

Alistair’s face darkens, dark blond hair falling across his eyes. “I was stuck with her for a year, don’t remind me. Mikah liked her enough, though. He could make anyone smile, even her.”

He laughs to himself, a fond, faraway chuckle. She watches him carefully.  _So the rumors are true,_ she thinks to herself. 

“I’m sorry for your loss,” she says out loud. “I understand he was important to you.”

Alistair’s smile is small and sad. “He was my whole world. Not a day goes by that I don’t wish that he was right here, with me.” A leather halla charm dangles across his neck, and he touches thoughtfully. “But Mikah  is gone, and his death saved thousands from the Blight. All I can do is remember him, and do his memory justice.” 

_Justice._ Branwen tenses at the word, and regrets it immediately. Alistair’s eyes widen. She can see his pause, the light of realization dart across his eyes, the tick of scratching his beard, because he  _wants_ to ask. She can already hear the words forming on his tongue-  _I’m sorry for your loss too._ She’ll do her best not to laugh, for what use is it to give condolences to a murderer?

“…But I’m sure you didn’t send for me to talk about the Hero of Ferelden,” Alistair says slowly, instead. Branwen lets out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding.

“No,” she agrees. “That’s not why I asked you to meet me here.” The tavern somehow seems louder, the bar keeper talking good naturedly to a pair of hooded figures who flash him a spot of silver. Shady places, shady people. An echo of an ache she can never sooth. She fiddles with the leather band in her hair, before straightening herself, and leaning forward intently. 

“What do you know about red lyrium?”


	2. Chapter 2

If there was ever a reason anyone moved to Kirkwall, it certainly wasn’t for the sunshine.

The sunlight in Kirkwall was always a tinted yellow, a sickly pale color that crawled across the renovated ruins of Hightown and the shabby squalor of Lowtown. Even the sunrise was far from a treat—nothing but a thin bloody gold that sometimes left her missing the rich red and orange hues that greeted her each morning in Lothering. Even Isabela would scrunch her nose.

“You know, we have a saying for mornings like this,” she once told Hawke, one early trek on the Wounded Coast. “’Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Red sky at morning, sailors take warning.’”

Merrill had paused the cleansing of her cuts, cocking her head in thought while folding a bloodied handkerchief.

“Warning? Warning for what?” she pondered.

Isabela shrugged. “Warning that a shitstorm is brewing in a distance, and you’d be an idiot if you’d think you could beat it.”

“But every morning is like this,” Merrill had chirped. Isabela snorted and went back to emptying sand from her boots. 

“Kirkwall is one giant shitstorm, if you ask me, Kitten.”

There had been a snort, from the back of their merry little entourage. That deep blood gold that looked so wrong in the dark blue of the sky was almost gentle in the way it settled into the reddish blonde of his hair, even as it cut a somber shadow across his brow.

“I don’t know,” Hawke remembered herself saying. “I think it’s rather lovely.”

 

 

\--

Years later, the sky once again turned a deep, blazing red. Blood and gold, and everything was lost.

 

Blood and gold, just like his hair.

\--

 

 

_Commander gone. Come quickly, alone._

 

_-A_

 

She had expected a trap. The strange painted elf who had slipped her the missive weeks ago hadn’t been the usual in between, and the letter had been too short, too desperate.

The words were undoubtedly written by Alistair’s hand, as was the accompanying, hastily drawn map. The unsteady, sloppy lines hinted at being written in a frenzied fear of being caught. But the summon was sudden, and its urgency had not quite sat well with her gut. Branwen hadn’t seen or spoken to Alistair directly since their first meeting months ago, and there had never been a need to congregate once more face to face. All Branwen had needed was a handful of trustworthy ears within the Grey Warden’s ranks, and Alistair had helped her weave a thin but useful web.

If there had ever been news too sensitive for the written word, Alistair would send Sigrun, or if he was truly desperate, Nathaniel. However much the Howe hated her, he trusted Alistair thrice over. So no matter how Branwen looked at it, the entire business of traveling to some secluded hut in some isolated spot in a largely uninhabited area left her wary of what awaited her.

Still she traveled to the Storm Coast, cutting a small and lonely figure along the expanse of clouded horizons.

 

 --

 

The small shack rattles under the rains of the Storm Coast and so do Branwen’s bones. Her ram skin cloak does nothing against the cold and wet that sunders through thin plank walls, leaving her with damp clothes pressing upon damp skin. But in this moment, all Branwen can feel is the heat of sweat and blood burning into her flesh as she slams her blade into the gaping mouth of a Hungered corpse.

She had expected a trap. Maybe the Carta, or the Raiders, or even the Tal-Vashoth.

She hadn’t expected demons. Which, considering she had lived in _Kirkwall_ for a decade, had been a hell of an oversight.

 _I am a spectacular brand of stupid,_ Branwen thinks to herself, and quickly surveys her foes.

Three of them are shambling, rotting carcasses barely held together by tendrils of dark magic. These, she assumes, are the original inhabitants of the cabin.  The thin cotton garbs that drape across the weathered brown of their bones are marred and ripped with age, and the flesh that clings onto their frame is few and far between.

But the last one…the last one is fresh. His body is full, intact. She’d pin his demise anywhere between the last day or week-- from a distance, he would have passed for a living man. Up close, however, the deep slit across his throat and the greyness in his skin marks him as one of the dead.

This one’s presence troubles her. Partly because this one is armed with a broadsword and not a hunting knife or dagger. Partly because of the Warden insignia that graces his breastplate. But mostly because his eyes are dead, but not lifeless, and they are trained on her with a sad and startling ache.

One of the older corpses lunges at her, crying out something choked and guttural before swinging its butcher knife towards her throat. Branwen braces herself, stepping quickly to the side, before raising her blade and pummeling down. The cabin rattles at the weight of her strikes, and Branwen curses silently. Perhaps if they were in the open air of the Coast, she would have had an easier time of it, but the space is tight and cramped. With every swing of her sword, she worries she’ll bring the whole of the hut down upon herself. 

The undead, if not strategic, are instinctive. Two sense her hesitation, and attempt to flank her. Branwen grits her teeth. Damn it all, who gave a fat fuck if the roof collapsed upon her? It would be an end, nothing more and nothing less. 

Flashes of lightning pierce through the boarded window, and Branwen lets out a howling curse before raising her greatsword and barreling it down onto the creature. The hut shakes again with the force of the hit, and splinters rain down upon her trembling shoulders, but that doesn’t matter. The frail bone finally shatters beneath the teeth of her sword, and the thing lets out shrieking wail before collapsing onto the floor in two gory halves.

She doesn’t have the chance to catch her breath, before there is another ear-piercing shriek. The undead fling themselves at her, unconcerned with the remains of their comrade staining their feet. They don’t care. All they know is the Hunger, and howl half mad with the need to devour. All, except one. The dead Warden just stares at her with a look that is cold and distant, but not empty. Almost _mournful,_ if the undead had the ability to give two shits beyond the need to kill.

He’s waiting for something _,_ she realizes. But for what? 

 _Less thinking, more killing,_ she tells herself and focuses on the blood thrumming hot in her veins, the thrill of a kill giving her that last swell of energy to swing her blade in an angry and perfect circular strike. 

Three down. 

The remaining corpse watches idly as the bodies collapse onto the floor. His gaze slowly leaves the mess of flesh and gore and snaps towards hers. The Warden’s eyes are a misty grey, glazed with the hue of the dead. But they are not lifeless. They are not empty. This one is observant. This one is intelligent. 

Branwen’s heart stops. A cold sweat breaks across her flesh, and before she can stop herself, she takes a step back. 

“Show yourself, demon,” she commands it, but there’s a crack in her voice that she can’t contain, and suddenly she’s the fool she was a decade ago. 

He begins to walk towards her with a slow, but steady gait. The silverite armor clamors with every step he takes, and his sword drags against wooden planks with an awful scratch. This one does not shamble. This one does not limp. This one walks with his gorged neck held high, almost righteous, almost proud. This one’s eyes look upon her with a raw and wretched gaze, with something that tastes of agony. Of pain. 

Her vision blurs, and her cheeks are wet. When did the tears begin to fall? 

Thunder rolls and she almost believes she hears it roaring from within him. A storm barely contained within a prison of flesh. 

Not Rage. Not Hunger. 

She forgets how to breathe. She forgets how to think. All she can do is fall on her knees and let her sword clatter uselessly beside her. 

“ _Vengeance,_ ” Hawke whispers. 

The Warden looms over her. His face is set and grim, just like that night so long ago. 

“No,” Hawke softly corrects herself. “Justice.” 

The Warden says nothing. Only raises his sword above his head. Every muscle in Hawke’s body screams for her to pick up her sword, to move, to _fight._ But she ignores it all. 

“Is this Justice?” she asks warily. 

This one does not respond. This one merely swings his sword down upon her head… 

…only for it to be struck with a sudden, blinding light. 

Branwen whirls around. A spray of rain lands upon her flesh before she realizes that the cabin’s door is swung wide open, rattling wildly in the winds of the Storm Coast. A clap of lightening blinds her for but a moment, and when she opens her eyes, a blur of blue and silver barrels through the small, enclosed space and rams straight into the dead Warden. They both tumble down with a might _thud._  

“Maker’s _breath,_ ” Alistair swears, as the _thing_ squirms and screeches beneath him. He closes his eyes and mutters something under his breath, and there it is again, another Holy Smite. Smoke steams from the grey, bloated flesh, like a slug sprinkled with salt. Alistair glimpses at her briefly through a muss of tangled brown hair, before he raises his shield once more and slams it straight into the creature’s skull. The howl is ungodly, like nothing else she’s ever heard. A lonely, sobbing scream, and then absolutely nothing. 

It’s quiet for a long moment, save for deep and heavy breaths. Alistair rises up from his knees and gives the corpse a long, sobering stare, before walking over to Branwen and offering a hand. 

“Are you alright?” he asks softly. “I’m so sorry. It looks like she got here before I did.” 

“She?” Branwen asks dumbly. She takes his hand, and rises to her feet, but her eyes have yet to leave the dead Warden lying across from her. A strange, empty shell. 

“Yes,” Alistair says with a sigh. “There’s…a lot I need to tell you. Much more than I could say in a letter.” 

The silence settles upon them once again, an uncomfortable and unshakeable burden. Alistair coughs, and scratches his beard. He wanted to ask, again. Damn him, and damn his tells. 

“I heard you screaming,” Alistair says carefully. “I heard you talking to that demon.” 

She grits her teeth. “And what of it?” 

“That was not Vengeance.” His words are soft but heavy, and Branwen can see the settle of pain in his brow. A hand reaches up to touch the leather halla dangling from his neck. 

An unearthly shriek rattles them both from their words. It a sad and mournful sound. Not a howl of hunger, nor is it a vengeful roar. The blood drains from her face, but all she can manage is to gasp out before the air tightens around her skin and they are both thrust onto the floor.  Pain thrums hot through her veins, her heart pups wildly, and a despair demon rises from the cabin’s inky shadows.

Alistair kicks her long forgotten broadsword towards her, already on his feet. 

“It was Despair.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess I'm just posting as I go.


End file.
